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Until this man.

And she well knew that coming from this man, Society’s wickedest rake, it was an empty endearment at that.

But her mind didn’t care.

Some part of her, a part of her that longed for that closeness still, a part of her she’d believed dead after Charles’s betrayal, stirred at that gruff word.

Sighing softly, she surrendered more fully to Andrew and his embrace.

Nay, their embrace.

He gripped her buttocks, sinking his fingers into the flesh, molding his palms to her, and Marcia’s breath quickened.

As if of their own volition, her hips began to move scandalously against him, and as the carriage swayed gently back and forth, she rocked her hips in a bid to be closer, in a bid for… something she’d never before known, something she couldn’t identify, but something she was so very desperate for.

He grunted, an animalistic dissolution of speech that only further fueled that sharp pressure between her legs.

Then he was guiding her closer, giving her more, pressing her against the rigid length outlined by his breeches.

It was too much, this fiery sensation and yearning, and she turned from his kiss, burying her head in the crook of his shoulder and clinging tightly to him.

And it proved the wrong movement, too.

He immediately stopped what he was doing, and she secretly cried out at that abrupt cessation. She registered that, at some point, the carriage had stopped.

“Is this what you want?” he whispered harshly against her ear. “To be tupped in a carriage like a common whore?”

Her heart squeezed painfully as his cold question brought Marcia crashing sharply back to earth. And mayhap it was because it was this man—who was a friend—who spoke to her in frosty tones she didn’t recognize, that she felt a sudden urge to cry.

“Hmm?” he jeered, running his palms over her thighs, which were still splayed over his legs.

He was taunting her.

She bit the inside of her cheek, reminding herself that Andrew wanted no part of the favor she’d put to him, and that was what drove him.

Marcia forced her features into a thoughtful mask and made a show of considering his question.

“Is this what it means to live a sinful existence?” She smiled. “Then, yes.” His eyes flared, and she curved her lips into a wider smile. “Thank you for your first lesson, my lord,” she said. “This was quite enjoyable, and I am looking forward to more of our time together.”

With that, she patted his hand, climbed off his lap, and opened the door herself.

She paused only long enough to peek inside at him. The moon doused the carriage in a white glow, and she took in Andrew’s slack jaw and immobile form.

Good. She’d shocked him now. “Shall we say tomorrow at one o’clock in the morning, my lord? Lord and Lady Edgerton are hosting a ball.”

“And never tell me, you intend to just slip off?”

“They’re my parents’ neighbors, Andrew,” she said. It would be entirely too easy for her to tell her parents she would be spending yet another night with Faith and then sneak off. “I will meet you at the end of their street.”

He stared at her with something akin to dread. “You really have thought of everything.”

Marcia waggled her eyebrows. “Everything.” Her fingers still shaking from his touch, she attempted a breezy wave. “I shall see you tomorrow!”

And then, with her legs still unsteady, she managed to make her way across the street to Faith’s household.

Chapter 8

Andrew had made many mistakes in the course of his twenty-eight-year existence.